China’s dominant social media platform WeChat has reached 1bn accounts worldwide, highlighting how the service that is used for everything from communication to shopping is continuing to extend its reach.

中国占主导地位的社交媒体平台微信(WeChat)的全球账户已经达到10亿，突显这一从通信到购物无所不包的服务还在继续扩大触角范围。

Pony Ma, chief executive of Tencent, the country’s most valuable listed company which owns WeChat, said the platform had hit the landmark figure during last month’s lunar new year festival. He made the remarks on the sidelines of the opening of China’s parliament yesterday, to which he is a delegate.

Although Mr Ma referred to “users”, a company spokesperson clarified this meant “user accounts”, not individuals.

虽然马化腾说的是“用户”，但该公司发言人澄清说，这是指“用户账户”，而非个人。

Tencent often refers to “MAUs” in its quarterly reports, a term that typically means monthly active users and is used by Silicon Valley companies to highlight their popularity and reach. But the Chinese company is referring to accounts rather than individuals. WeChat users sometimes register multiple accounts, for example, one for work and another for personal use.

The company reported annual growth in WeChat user accounts of 15.8 per cent last September.

去年9月，腾讯公布微信用户账户同比增长15.8%。

Market research firm eMarketer has estimated that WeChat had 494.3m individual users across China last year.

市场研究公司eMarketer估计，去年，微信在中国的个人用户达到4.943亿。

The service dominates China’s app market. It is used as a social messaging app that has largely displaced work emails, but also as a platform for mobile payments, ecommerce, train bookings and blogs, as well as being host to a universe of other apps. Chinese users often jokingly call WeChat a public utility.

Retailers from outside the country are also starting to use it to sell directly to Chinese consumers: the EU’s SME centre recently launched a service to help small businesses create WeChat online shops.

中国境外的零售商也开始使用微信直接向中国消费者销售：欧盟的中小企业中心最近推出了一项服务，帮助小型企业在微信上开设网店。

However, growth in WeChat use overseas is limited by the popularity of existing platforms outside China such as WhatsApp. The Facebook-owned messaging service says it reached 1.3bn MAUs globally last July.